A Music Genome for Avila

Since the start of the year, I have become a huge fan of the Music Genome Project and its web site, Pandora (www.pandora.com). If you haven’t experienced Pandora and you like music, you are in for a treat. You identify an artist or a song and from the classification of the artist’s music or the song (which occurs along 400 characteristics, its musical equivalent of DNA), Pandora creates a station of music that matches. You can edit and add artists, give a song a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” and in this fashion tweak your station. Finally, you can create up to 100 such stations.

As I have listened to my Pandora stations, I have wondered about the characteristics of my own musical DNA (that is the music to which I am especially attracted) and how my musical DNA is affected by or affects my moods or the circumstances. Can I create stations that represent these moods or help me change them—music around which to be thoughtful, music around which to be upbeat, etc.?

If all of us at Avila shared our stations and we analyzed our tastes along these 400 characteristics would we find anything in common? Do those attracted to the university as its students, faculty, and staff share anything in common?

Universities these days try to define that which makes them distinctive and sets them apart from all others, the University’s DNA, much like a song’s DNA. A university’s DNA is certainly linked to its mission, its programs, and services, but it is also influenced by its people, those who live and work here, and who contribute to the unique experiences we create for each other.

My experiences with Pandora and the Music Genome Project prompt me to wonder about Avila’s DNA.